“This might take a mini-civil war within Mexico proper, to accomplish.”
Totally. It is not beyond the possibility however to have a mini-battle with the cartels that could drag out for a year. The drug and human smugglers may torch a few of our own and President Trump will retaliate with targeted force we haven’t seen since we have been alive. Then they can have civil war in Mexico after we take out the worst of the worst.
Mexico’s last civil war (1910-1922) never ended, it was just that everyone ran out of bullets. The same cultural fault lines that fueled then exist today, unresolved. It would not take very much start it all over again, nor would it end so indecisively this time.